Ulan Ude is located 150 miles southeast of Lake Baikal, and is a valley.

This place was originally an area inhabited by the Cossacks. Later, after the Russians came to East Siberia and conquered the Cossacks, the place belonged to Russia.

At first, Ulan Ude was not called this name, but Uginsk Castle, and later it was renamed Ulan Ude.

From its original name, we can see that this city was originally a castle. In the Siberian region, there were many similar castles, and later it gradually became a city.

The population of the entire Ulan-Ude is not large. After Russia occupied this place, it immigrated one after another. In addition to the population of various ethnic groups in the nearby areas, the population of the entire Ulan-Ude area is about 50,000, and the people and troops living in the Ulan-Ude city are about 10,000.

If these people are in the Ming Dynasty, the population of a small county is several times or even dozens of times that of it. However, in places like Siberia, the entire region has a population of 50,000, which is considered a big city. So from this point of view, Ulan-Ude is an important town second only to Irkutsk in the jurisdiction of the Governor's Office of the Far East.

The terrain of Ulanwude is very good. Its north and west are highlands. The Selenge River flows through the west of Ulanwude, and turns north to the north from the high ground and then faces west, and finally flows to Lake Baikal.

To the east is a long and narrow valley, and the end of the valley to the west is Ulanwude. In the southwest of Ulanwude, there is a small plain. The Selenge River passes through the plain. If you want to attack this place, there are only two roads to go. One road is to directly attack Ulanwude through the valley from east to west, and the other road is to march from southwest to northeast, pass through the small plain in southwest of Ulanwude and then cross the Selenge River to attack Ulanwude.

From these we can see why the Cossacks built a castle in Ulan Ude, and why the Russians took over this place and then managed Ulan Ude as a major town.

From the small plain southwest of Ulan Ude and crossing the Selenge River to attack Ulan Ude, this is unrealistic for the Ming army, because the Ming army not only has to detour for nearly a thousand miles, but also the Russian army of Ulan Ude will directly exit the valley in the east, which will not only cut off the Ming retreat, but will even lead to the Ming army being unable to take Ulan Ude in a short time.

Yang Xu was a man who fought an old war, so he naturally would not do this, so he marched westward from the valley and rushed straight to Ulan-Ude.

Advancing from the valley also has certain risks. The valley is about a hundred miles from east to west, and the valley is west and north of the valley. The width of the entire valley is more than twenty miles northwest, and the narrowest point is only five or six miles.

In order to station Ulan-Ude, Russia has narrowed its defense line and set up a defensive front in the valley. It is not easy to fight directly from the valley. If the attack is unfavorable and the Russians use the terrain to counterattack, the Ming army may also suffer great losses.

But no matter what, Yang Xu will not lose money when fighting? What's more, his current opponent is still the fierce and powerful Russia.

When Yang Xu fought with the Qing Dynasty, he was different from his life-threatening battle. In his opinion, this battle must be fought, and it is better to fight early than to fight late, and time does not wait for anyone. Although it is summer now, the summer in the north comes sooner. Once the short autumn comes, the Ming army will face the threat of severe winter.

It's okay in Liaodong, but how could the Ming army spend the winter in this ghost place in the wild? The snowy season was already a bit too hard to provide logistics supplies, not to mention. If there were no elite troops such as the Ming army, they would be trapped here and be frozen to death by the cold wind blowing from hell.

As soon as Ortai's cavalry arrived, Yang Xu began to attack the valley without waiting for Ortai's main force to arrive. All the Mongolian cavalry were dispersed by Yang Xu, and the Mongolian cavalry was useless in the battle in the valley. These cavalry mainly ensured the safety of the Ming army's rear route.

As for logistics, Yang Xu has temporarily put it aside. His troops have accumulated a lot of supplies. It is no problem to support them for a month. The key is to break the Russian army's defense line in the valley and directly take down Ulan-Ude.

The entire valley was nearly a hundred miles long, and it would take two to three days if the Ming army passed normally. Because the valley was narrow, the Ming army did not advance in large numbers and advanced forward in battalions.

The progress of entering the valley was quite smooth, but after the current forward advanced for more than 30 miles, as the valley gradually narrowed, the defense line set by the Russians was right in front of him.

It has to be admitted that the Russians have excellent defense settings in the valley. In an area of ​​ten miles long and less than six miles wide, Russia not only set up a temporary fortress in the center of the valley, but also set up several camps in the highlands on both sides of the valley.

These camps were equipped with cannons, and I don’t know how the Russians got them up. Although there were not many cannons, they were in excellent position. From top to bottom, not only curbed the major traffic routes in the valley, but more importantly, such camps and cannons opposite the Ming army were difficult to attack the Russians.

To put it bluntly, once the war begins, Russian artillery can easily block and attack the Ming army by relying on the terrain, but the Ming army has no choice. Although the Ming army's artillery is stronger than Russian artillery in terms of firing rate and range, this kind of power is limited, and it is difficult to reach the artillery from bottom to top.

The battle started the day after the Ming army entered the valley. The Ming army attacked the Russians' fortress in the valley with one battalion head-on. In addition, two battalions attacked the highlands on both sides from the west and north directions, intending to pull out the camps set up by the Russians in the highlands.

Yang Xu knew very well that if he wanted to open up the main roads of the valley, it was extremely difficult to attack head-on. He had to take down the high ground on both sides first, and then completely defeat the Russian fortress. However, it was not so easy to take down the high ground on both sides. The Russians set up the camps with great positions. Not only was the Ming army unable to expand its troops on this terrain, but it was not easy to climb up to the high ground, let alone take them directly?

After half a day of battle, the casualties of the Ming army increased one after another. Except for one battalion that attacked head-on, the other two battalions could send only about one company at a time.

This made the Ming army's military advantage over Russia disappear in this place. In addition, the artillery fire carried by the Ming army did not have any threatening effect on the high ground camps besides head attacks.

"Master, this battle is so awkward!" The vanguard regiment commander was covered in a gray face and was covered in embarrassment. His troops were beaten back by condescending Russians several times. Not only did they fail to achieve any results, but their brothers were killed or injured.

"Don't listen to the reasons, I want the result!" Yang Xu asked coldly: "I will ask you, can I take this mountain down? When can I take it down? If you can't do it, I'll replace it!"

"Master, give me three days, no! Two days!" The commander of the vanguard regiment gritted his teeth. Of course, he understood what Yang Xu meant. As the main regiment of the main division, he had fought in many battles in the south and north, but he had never fought such a difficult battle. However, no matter how difficult it was to fight, he had to fight. Now the high ground on both sides tightly suppressed the progress of the Ming army. If the Ming army did not take the high ground, it would be impossible to advance.

After turning around, the forward team leader ran back to the front line. At this time, his battalion commander came over to complain, and the meaning in his words was almost no different from that of him and Yang Xu.

"Zhang Dayan! Say less nonsense, tell me, you can do it or not? If you can't do it, I will take people up in person!" The regiment commander glared at the battalion commander and scolded him.

"Yes! Why can't it be!" The battalion commander gritted his teeth and replied. The regiment commander said this, can he say it's not possible?

Just as the battalion commander turned around and wanted to organize the next attack, the regiment commander grabbed him.

"Big eyes, war depends on your brain!" The regiment commander pointed to the high ground on both sides: "There is no use to fight Man Chong, do you see? You can take this slope for me now, and then pull the cannons up after taking it down. I want to see whose cannon is powerful!"

The battalion commander looked closely and immediately understood the regiment commander's meaning, and immediately nodded in agreement. Then, the regiment commander asked another unit to cooperate with the main attacking battalion commander to suppress the firepower line of the Russians in the highlands and attack the hillside to the north at all costs.
Chapter completed!